


Meet the Morgans

by deathgurgle



Category: Forever (TV)
Genre: Adam begins his redemption arc, Adam is sarcastic and snarky, Adam is still a decent man, Adam please behave yourself, Canon Temporary Character Death, Gen, Henry is just tired, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-28
Updated: 2015-12-28
Packaged: 2018-05-07 05:26:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,203
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5444876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deathgurgle/pseuds/deathgurgle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Adam meets some members of Team Morgan.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Freedom

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DealingDearie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DealingDearie/gifts).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My gift for Midgard on tumblr! The prompt: "If it's for a fic, maybe something about the rest of Team Morgan (may include Lucas, if he's in the loop by then-who knows) meeting Adam (Abe technically 'met him' already but still)."
> 
> Hope this gives what you wanted! :-)

"I never wanted it to come to this."

Henry has been here for an hour now, saying the same old things that he's been saying since he incapacitated Adam two years previous. He fidgets in the chair beside Adam's hospital bed, adjusting his cuffs and re-crossing his legs. He finally looks up at his fellow immortal's face and sees the same blank expression it has held since he was paralyzed. Henry looks down at his hands again, folded in his lap.

"I know there is still a decent man in you," he begins, taking a steady breath, "I... _want_ for there to still be a decent man in you, if you and I are truly the same."

None of this is new to Adam. Henry was always insisting that he wasn't anything like Adam, that they may have started off in similar circumstances, but time clearly destroyed whatever Adam once was. But lately... Henry has been suggesting that he could still be that same decent man from two thousand years ago, that there could be a way for him to lose some of his hardened exterior, maybe he and Henry _could_ be the same.

"I want to help you, Adam."

If he could, Adam would _laugh_.

"I really think you are a decent man underneath but that man has been chipped away with time. That man is still there inside you, Adam." Henry drums his fingers on his thighs, stills. He sighs. "I understand that you were trying to help me. You were trying to... desensitize me to the harshness of this world, you got me possessions from my past, and you even helped me on _cases_. But time and negative experience has harmed you, you don't know how to act appropriately, I think."

It's nice hearing Henry say he realizes that Adam was trying to help, just get close to him, even with the backhanded method telling him he went about things all wrong. Adam wants to sigh.

"I want to help you," Henry repeats. "I believe you are willing to try to change, to be that decent man from your past, and I'm sure that you've had the time to think about... well, everything."

Adam notices how Henry does not mention how he is the reason why he's in a hospital bed unable to move a single muscle. Even if Henry wants Adam to become that decent man again, to be more like him, he knows that in the long run, it's Henry that is going to be more like him. With such a short amount of time to influence him, Henry had incapacitated Adam without much visible remorse, which _certainly_ wasn't something he thinks Henry would have done in the beginning.

_Who is turning out like whom?_

"I'm going to free you, and we can talk. Man to man. Two voices." Henry stands and steps out of Adam's view, just to the side of his head. He sees a filled syringe wave in front of his eyes only to disappear just as quickly just where he can't see it. "I'm going to poison you. Abraham will get you at the river and I will meet with the both of you."

 _This is new_ , Adam thinks, _this is exciting._

Henry draws a slow breath. "Please don't make me regret this."

And then Henry is cradling the back of Adam's head and plunging the needle into his neck, emptying the syringe, and Adam watches Henry's face before his vision begins to fail him and he's experiencing the peace that death gives him.


	2. Abraham

When Adam emerges from the river, he's gasping and shivering and _oh_ , he can feel goosebumps flaring across his arms and his legs and torso and he can feel how cold the water is and how the wind bites at his face and whatever else is above the water's surface. He can _feel_ and he can _move_ and he chokes out a laugh and shivers again, looking around for anyone that might be nearby and stopping when he spots Henry's son reclining back against the hood of a parked car some distance away. He swims toward the shore, grateful that the nippy weather of New York in the fall seems to keep people away from the river front, and he makes his way to Abraham who holds out a towel for him to take.

"You know, I wanted to really meet you and learn about you and all, but I didn't want to learn _this_ much about you," he comments, teasing, but Adam just works at drying himself off with the towel, rubbing away at the beads of water that drip down his arms and neck and legs.

He still doesn't say anything when Abraham hands him a pair of sweatpants, a long-sleeved shirt, and a pair of sneakers which he immediately dons, thankful to have something to shield him from the brisk air. Toweling off his hair so that it will stop dripping down the back of his shirt, he hears Abe begin to talk again.

"So, are you really two thousand years old?"

Adam pauses and only nods in answer. Abe whistles and crosses his arms over his chest.

"Seems like time helps you adapt, huh? You seem much better with technology these days than Henry is. The man thinks microwaves are the tool of the devil."

Adam continues to stay quiet. Henry had told him to wait there with Abraham until he arrived, apparently to whisk him away somewhere to have a real chat, _one with two voices_. So they stand there, silent and waiting, and Adam knows that it's going to be some time until Henry shows up, but he's patient. He's waited longer for more menial things before, he could stand to wait with his fellow immortal's son for a while in the comfortable silence that had grown between them. But it isn't long until Abe pipes up again, and Adam turns to look at him with his usual plain expression.

"Y'know, Henry talks about you but... I don't really _know_ you." Abe looks at Adam with a curious twinkle in his eye. "I want to know about the man who is so close to my father."

Adam hesitates, his brow furrows briefly, and then he nods, resigned.

"My first life took place in Rome," he starts, needing to harshly clear his throat, wet his lips, "and it was there that I was stabbed in the stomach and died defending a man who was... important."

Abe nods and makes a gesture with his hand for Adam to continue, so he does.

"When I came back from death, I was quite surprised, and so were the people who had seen me die. I was accused of sorcery and was ordered to be stoned to death. I decided to abandon Rome and the life I had there. I managed to stay low all the way to Constantinople where I stayed for... quite some time." He pauses again and he thinks back, digging up ancient memories he hasn't reflected on in years, _centuries_. "It was strange, watching leaders and successors rise and fall while I remained, but I grew used to it after the first thousand years or so. Henry will see, he just needs more time."

Abraham raises both eyebrows and nods. "That's, uh... quite a life right there. I thought Henry's was rough—"

"Henry's life? His has been nothing. I've died from the Bubonic Plague, small pox, influenza, mumps, dysentery, scarlet fever," that sets him off, voice raising as he turns to look at Abraham fully. He's feeling anger suddenly flare, the frustration he felt when he was paralyzed because of Henry coming out now that he can speak. "I've been stabbed and shot and hanged and drowned and tortured. Henry has a long way to go before he understands just how _rough_ life gets. He needs to have a head start, to know before it happens to him, he needs to know how to live in this world and _I'm_ the only one who can teach him. I've been trying to _help_ him and he—"

Adam stops and draws in a sharp breath, puts on a calm exterior with a practiced ease as he collects himself.

"But... now," he begins with a regained control, a sarcastic smile spreading across his mouth, "he wants to _chat_ , and I have _loved_ having our little chats."

Abe clears his throat and nods. "I see."

Adam turns away again and stares out across the river, resigned to waiting again.

"You've been trying to help him. Us. You gave him his gun, you gave me that Nazi ledger." He turns his head toward the other man and a smile pulls at his lips. "I got to learn about my parents. Because of you."

"I was just trying to show Henry that I'm not some terrible adversary." Adam shrugs. "I wanted to make amends."

Abraham turns and pulls Adam into a tight embrace, arms keeping him secure against himself. Adam stays put, makes no move to reciprocate nor to move away, but he turns his head when he hears a car pulling up, spying Henry in the backseat of a cab, paying his fair and then getting out.

"Thank you," comes a choked whisper from Abe. Adam locks eyes with Henry as he approaches, and he reaches a hand up to place on Abe's back.


	3. Conditional Freedom

Henry brings Adam back to his antiques shop and down into his lab and leaves Abraham upstairs, leaving the two immortals alone in private.

"I'm sure you have plenty to say to me," Henry starts, but Adam immediately interrupts him.

"Now that I am _able_ to speak, yes."

Henry presses his lips into a thin line, stares down at his feet and nods.

"Oh don't look so glum, Henry. You don't have anything to be guilty for." Adam walks up to the other man, and he has a sympathetic look in his eyes that makes Henry nervous more than anything. "You kept me your _prisoner_ for a couple years even though all I was trying to do was to _help_ you, but that's nothing to feel bad about. In fact, I'm proud of you."

Henry makes a face like he's been slapped.

"I am, Henry. Truly. You gathered the courage to do something to me that's crueler than death. That was very unlike you. It reminded me..." Adam smiles and it's _genuine_ , "of _me_."

"Stop," Henry says firmly, and Adam does, just closes his mouth and looks at Henry. " _That_ is what we need to discuss. I don't need to change, to be more like you. That is the path that I do not wish to go down."

Adam squints at him. "This path is the one that will be less painful—"

"I'm not finished," Henry barks, and Adam stops again. " _I_ want to help _you_. I want you to be that decent man from two thousand years ago; I know you can be. Time can bury parts of us, but it doesn't erase who we are."

Adam's eyes flick down to where Henry's hand had subconsciously moved to feel where his pocket watch was nestled in his vest.

"Not having someone you know will live on with you, someone you will never have to mourn for... I believe that is what made you this way." Henry's eyes soften and it makes Adam want to sneer. "But... we have one another now."

Adam watches Henry, looks at his face and doesn't see any lie. "You wanted nothing to do with me. Why are you so _invested_ in me now?"

"Because," Henry says, holding out his hand, "we have eternity together. I want it to be with a decent man."

A beat passes between them, Adam hesitates

"... All right," he says, finally, and then he takes Henry's hand in a steel grip. "Tell me what you want me to do."


	4. Jo

Adam had a plan about meeting Henry's work partner, the woman he spends so much time around. He was going to approach her on his own, tell her of his relationship with Henry, see what she knew about him, if she knew of his condition. And maybe he'd tell her about how they shared this affliction, that Henry wasn't the only immortal in this world. He had a _plan_.

Instead, he's being cuffed and lead to a police vehicle by Jo, having his rights listed off to him.

He keeps quiet, flexing his _right to remain silent_  that Jo reminds him he possesses as he's put into the back of the car, and he stays quiet all the way to the familiar police station that he knows Henry is also in, likely working on a different case. He actually catches a glimpse of his fellow immortal chatting with a different woman a fair distance away, smirks at the shocked and equally exasperated expression Henry's face flashes when he glances over and sees Adam being led toward interrogation.

Adam sighs as he sits down in the little room, keeps his eye on the door after Jo leaves to go get whatever _evidence_ she has to get him to admit to his crime. He raises his eyebrows when the door opens and it's Henry who enters and has a disapproving look aimed right at Adam.

" _What_ did you _do_?" Henry hisses, hands clenched at his sides in frustration. Adam shrugs.

"I'm a _prime suspect_ ," he says with a subtle giddiness in his voice, huffing a sarcastic laugh. "I was the _sole survivor_ in a building collapse, so of course they assume I had something to do with it. I assure you though, I did die in the wreck."

Henry sighs like he's relieved.

"Were you expecting something else?"

"I was dreading that perhaps you'd _killed somebody_ ," Henry answers, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Come now, Henry, how could you think so lowly of me? I'm a changed man now."

"It has been _four months_ , you are not a changed man."

"Yet."

" _Adam_ —"

The door opens and Jo walks in, a confused look on her face when she sees Henry.

"Henry, why are you in here? I haven't started my interrogation yet, and I didn't even ask you to help me." She looks at him cautiously, steps around him to put a folder on the metal table. "I only _just_ brought this guy in."

"Ah, well," Henry flounders and Adam smiles at him wolfishly, "I was just—"

"We know each other," Adam saves the other man the trouble of lying.

Henry just _looks_  at Adam.

"You do?" Jo asks, a skeptic eyebrow raised. "How?"

"It's a long story," Henry starts but Adam _snorts_.

" _My_ side of the story is longer—" Adam teases, but then Henry is interrupting him.

"Enough—!"

" _Okay_ , Henry, easy. Can I talk to you outside for a sec?" Jo cuts in, putting a firm hand on Henry's arm, and he draws a short, calming breath and nods, turning to leave the interrogation room with his partner immediately following him out.

Adam waits patiently while they have their little chat, where Henry is probably running around in circles trying to explain to the detective how he knows him while trying to keep both of their identities secret. He's a little surprised when Jo comes back in a short while later and releases his wrists of the metal cuffs. He raises a brow at her.

"Henry explained," she says with a sigh. "He didn't tell me much, but I get it now. I'm... glad that he has someone to be with him for the foreseeable future. You're free to go."

Adam stands, Jo opens the door.

"It was a pleasure to meet you, Detective Martinez, too bad it wasn't under... better circumstances." Adam extends a hand, waits for Jo to take it, and he gives hers a firm shake. She gives him a wary look but he just smiles.

"Yeah... pleasure was all mine, Adam."


	5. Lucas

It's months after Adam's first real encounter with Jo that he finds himself back in the brick building of the police station, but this time he's being invited without any accusations of crime, and this time it is Henry who brings him in. A strange death that has Henry baffled has him calling upon Adam for his opinion. Being around for two thousand years made one an expert of death, and well acquainted with strange ones.

Adam does help to determine Mister Graham's death after a few hours of speculation and examination, and when he's done, a young man is immediately coming up to him after Henry leaves to deliver his answer to Detective Martinez.

"Doc never calls in anyone for a second opinion, you've gotta be something special," the man says, and Adam thinks he remembers seeing Henry with this man before.

"Yes, well, we're... old friends," he dodges, trying to end the conversation, but the man won't let him be.

"Oh. _Oh_. Wait. Are you..?" The man looks around, makes sure that the morgue is empty. "You gotta be."

Adam gives him an unimpressed look.

"You're Henry's _old_ friend."

_He knows?  
_

"Right? You're," the man lowers his voice to a whisper, " _Adam_?"

Adam grabs a fist-full of the man's scrubs, yanks him in. "Who are _you_?"

"Hey hey hey, easy, okay?" The man is holding up his hands in surrender, his face betraying his anxiousness. "I-I'm Lucas? Henry's assistant— friend?"

Adam doesn't release him. "What do you know about Henry Morgan?"

Lucas swallows hard and takes a shuddering breath. "I know his secret, if that's what you mean? I know you both share it."

" _How?_ " Adam snarls and he knows he's going against what he promised Henry but their secrets are at stake and he has to protect that secret _no matter what_ —

"Henry told me!"

Adam squints, really looks at Lucas's face, looks for any indication that he's lying. When he's satisfied that Lucas is telling the truth, he releases him.

"Jeez, I know he said you could get aggressive but I wasn't expecting that." Lucas smooths out the bunched up fabric of his scrubs the best he can.

"Apologies," Adam spits, and Lucas just shrugs him off.

"Nah, it's okay, I get it. Big secret, don't want your cover blown. You and him are like... Batman and Superman or something."

Adam just stares at him.

"Oh, God, you are just as bad as Henry. You two need to go out and experience the media." Lucas suddenly gets a bright look in his eyes and Adam watches him carefully. "A popular sci-fi series just put out a new movie. I'm taking you two. You guys need this."

Adam sees the door behind Lucas open and it's Henry who's coming in.

"Ah, you're still here," Henry observes, looking cautiously between Adam and Lucas.

"We've been invited to a movie," Adam says _sweetly_ , and Henry looks at Adam with immense disapproval.

"Adam, _no_ —"

"Doc, please?" Lucas is giving Henry the saddest, kicked puppy expression and he just sighs.

"I'll... get my coat and scarf," he says, resigned, and he walks into his office to get his belongings, just faintly hearing Lucas talking to Adam again.

"So... what was Vlad the Impaler like?"


End file.
